


Seek and You Shall Find

by Lyssandra_Med



Series: One-Shot [30]
Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Alternate Universe - Voldemort Wins, Bellamione Cult War, Blood Magic, Corruption, Dark Hermione Granger, Discord: Bellamione Cult, F/F, Hat Trick (Of a sort), Hermione Granger Scores a Hat Trick, Horcruxes, Multi, One Shot, Praise Be to Doc, Ritual Magic, Team Furbae
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-10-15
Updated: 2019-10-15
Packaged: 2020-12-16 12:54:00
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,966
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21036551
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Lyssandra_Med/pseuds/Lyssandra_Med
Summary: Sometimes help is better off ignored.Or; Hermione helps Andromeda, in a roundabout way.





	Seek and You Shall Find

**Author's Note:**

  * For [drD](https://archiveofourown.org/users/drD/gifts).

> Prompt- "Bellatrix tasks Hermione with seducing Andy to the dark side so they can be a family again and Andy is like "I dunno, this seems bad." and then is like "Oops, I accidentially did a ritual and now I remember why I'm a Black in the first place."
> 
> I hope I've (mostly) delivered.
> 
> (Mostly edited, some errant typos, odd comma's, my apologies as I'm posting this late)

For every action there is a consequence.

She knew this fact like she knew the sky was blue, like she knew that the sun would rise again no matter their petty squabbles and doom-mongering down on earth. For an outcome to occur, there had to have been an inciting incident. 

_ A _ led to _ B. _

This was an obvious and consequential part of reality for her, one that ran through everything that she said, everything that she did, every choice and decision made with _ knowing, _ made with _ foresight, _ made for a _ purpose. _

The Boys had both asked her _ why, _ as if with only a few words they would understand each and every minute action that had led her to where she was now, as if she was able to be explained away and revealed with all the flourish and speed of some second grade street magician. There was no way (not with how little effort she was willing to exercise on her part,) that she could explain how she came to _ Z _ by way of _ Y, _ while still somehow ignoring the fact that it had all begun at _ A. _

Her reasons lay in their derision towards her multitude of interests; their compunction and harsh words that said learning was for suckers and people all too full of themselves. Their complaints, their begging, their groveling and maddening insistence that _ she _ be the one to help them through it all.

It was their constant and habitual oversight of her many achievements; how they wouldn’t have lived to see age twelve if not for her quick thinking and proclivity for over preparedness. And still, _ years later, _they refused to give her but the barest of thanks, as if the Boy Wonder himself had solved every problem and overcame every obstacle.

And then there had been her habitual desire for pain; manifested early enough as _ ‘artificial difficulty’, _ academically, socially, physically; she threw herself into it with gusto and a grin, then moaned and licked her well-earned wounds when done.

This was nothing, nothing at all, that she hadn’t done to herself.

_ A _ led to _ C, _ was exacerbated into an action labeled _ T, _ and then finally, mercifully, the chain was locked to completion at _ Z. _

The Locket.

The twisted metal gleamed gold beneath the sunlight while within itself it pumped out magic and emotion that left the Boy furious at everything and everyone, made Red paranoid at the world, and herself? It unleashed her inhibitions, filled her with heat all day and night; envious, bitter, hollowed out and left wanting for something more than mirthless thanks and resentful towards all they claimed as their own success. It magnified and enhanced the understanding that those who hated her for her blood existed on both sides, ran both sides, even if their rhetoric was different.

She was left with only a simple choice; decide where she wanted to be. She could join those who would present a front while blocking her from their own heights, or join with those who presented themselves as they were, ready and willing for her to prove her merit over her blood.

Between all that the Locket continued whispering in her ear and in her heart with honeyed words and deceiving secrets. She was under no pretenses that her mood and ideals were normal, that they weren’t being shaped and twisted into something it could use to keep itself safe, but in the end she found that even understanding the horror growing in her heart didn’t make her love it any less. If the outcome was favorable then the method didn’t matter, and there was no reason for her to be upset over something she couldn’t influence.

And the Locket (and by extension herself,) was nothing if not impossible to influence, the soul within too entrenched and powerful.

And really, after all, she _ had _ lit a Professor on fire during her first year. All her impulses and desires were already clearly known (to those who bothered to look). The Locket simply afforded her an outside view of herself, biased of course, but one she had needed all the same.

And now here she was, two years later and one War down, another brewing on the horizon if this pitiful rebellion wasn’t quashed fast enough. She had two witches on either side and a name now sanctified in blood and purposeful chaos; Black to match her soul to a darkened heart.

But as a group they were incomplete, missing their base, their hold, the final piece to their lovingly twisted little puzzle. 

And her Lovers couldn’t abide that any longer.

“Word is that she’s been sighted again, looking for revenge instead of shelter.”

“Revenge against who?”

“The ones who took the child I think; hurt and lashing out. It’s been ages since it happened, her waiting is just typical.”

“Where?”

“Outside a Muggle hovel, Ampston.”

“And,” she dug sharp fingers into the Elder pressed against her, shooting darkened eyes at Younger standing behind her, “You want me, _ me, _ to do this-.”

Voice and words failed her when sharp teeth began digging into her shoulder, a hand searching lower and lower against her stomach until it was clearly past the point of decency. The younger painted herself in the grin of a shark, violent and endearing, something wordless passing between the Sisters as she stewed.

“Y-you want me to pull her in? What makes you so sure she’d even listen to me? Last I checked I was on her list as well.”

The hand continued to wander lower until fabric was shoved aside in haste to play with wet and heat, “You can do it, that name we’ve given you to tout isn’t just for having a pretty face. Get it done, bring her back, _ make us whole.” _

\---

Finding the Middle wasn’t very hard, her tracks may have been hidden to the eyes of the newly christened Auror Corps but to her it was lit like a neon street sign; anyone at all with even half a working brain and enough involvement with arts much darker than the Light could have found her before it came to this point. Three days, five lackeys, thirteen possible locations. She blew through them all with an impersonal efficiency until she finally managed to corner the witch in a shack on the edges of the town, forlorn and abandoned by its original inhabitants and set upon by the elements.

It had been protected by a Fidelius but their recent fever pitch of invention had rendered that protection moot; quick, easy, and then there was nowhere left to run and nowhere in the world secure enough to hide. Waiting however, waiting was the hard part of her objective. Metal swayed between her breasts as she shook and shivered with anticipation, the call within it muttering lowly of secrets and arcana unknown to mortal hearts until the blood within her veins swirled and pulsed with desire for the confrontation to begin.

She would win and pull the witch back, or die; and death held no place within this new Empire of the Immortal.

Her silent musings were cut short when the door that led into the single room was opened by a wand, the tip pointed forward at where she sat. Her body was sprawled atop the table in the center with one leg hitched over the other and dress pulled up to part above her knees, low cut enough to accentuate her body in a way she knew the Other’s cherished, hopefully enough to lure the Middle in as well.

“Her-”

“No,” her words broke off with a harsh tone and a glare perfected to cut diamonds, “You don’t deserve to say it, not with what you’ve been doing. Or rather what you haven’t.”

“... So it’s all true then? What the Resistance says? That you’ve left to serve that Monster, even though-”

“Even though He _ what _ ?” She sat forward and placed her palms flat upon the table edge, “Yes, I serve beneath him, just as we all do now. Does that not speak to His generosity? To His capacity for forgiveness? I’ve remained unmolested, high in our new society thanks to my deeds and actions, not because of my blood. That’s all any of use have ever wanted, a society that doesn’t stick us into pits because of how we were born, so long as we show Him our worth. This is a just society, a society _ worth _ His salvation. So yes; I serve him proudly just as you should as well.”

“I don’t need a sermon,” the Middle’s voice rose with anger and displeasure, “I get more than enough of those from the Light. Are you here on his orders then? Or is this _ Her _ command? Send you to find me and do what? Please tell me, am I to die like my child? Are you her enforcer now? Her tool?”

“I’m nothing at all,” with care she slid herself off the table and walked forward on lifted heels, her eyes swirling with a cracked darkness that lit a flush atop her face, “I’m nothing but what you need me to be.”

“Then I don’t need you to be anything other than gone,” the woman stepped forward to her challenge, passing by with a checked shoulder and a rucksack dropping heavily to the floor, “I need you to leave.”

“You’re meant for us-”

“Oh,” she rounded on her again, anger swirling within her eyes, “And that includes you now, does it?”

“-You’re meant for more than pointless self-destruction. It can be a hard habit to break, seeing as you’ve been perfecting it for the better part of half a century, but we want you, we _ need _ you.” She moved to follow behind the Middle as she wandered off towards a sloppily put together bookshelf, hand raised up to grasp firm shoulders sculpted by age and a life on the run, “You know it, I know it, _ They _ know it.”

“Then tell me just how the hell do you know that? Just because you’ve spliced yourself onto the tree doesn’t mean there’s anything at all between us,” the Middle turned in place to lean back against the shelf, “You’re a branch with different bark; I don’t _ need _ you, nor do I _ want _ you.”

“You’re still on the tree you know,” she ran soft fingers down the Middle’s arm, “You were never removed, not really. Just some cosmetic damage to the tapestry hung up in Grimmauld, your heart still beats with ours. And besides all that, I’m neither a transplant nor a splice; blood adoption and marriage both work differently when you’ve already shared little pieces of your soul among one another.” She could feel the Middle stiffen at her words, eyes blown out until there was only Black, like the sister she so closely resembled.

“You-”

“Yes, and with His permission. But I’m not here to talk theory with you-, Well, unless you want to of course.” Her smile, already something sharp and predatory, grew sharper still as the Middle stilled her breath, a sheen of sweat breaking out all over her skin until she could practically smell it; all pheromone and desire. “We’re already more tied together than you’d realize, all we want is for you to come home, complete and safe. You’ve been gone far too long, _ They _ both miss you and despite how little we know of one another, I can’t help but feel I miss you too-”

A harsh shove of hands upon her shoulders had her stumbling backwards and into the table behind her, the woman standing before her now a copy of the Elder; Black and mad, and oh so very dangerous, all sharp points and cutting edges.

“Get _ out,” _ she spat the words through clenched teeth, “I don’t need you, I don’t want you, now _ leave _ before I have to make you.”

She smirked into the danger that the Middle presented, something wild and unhinged that bore far more than just a passing resemblance her benefactors, “Fine then, little Andy is a strong woman now, all grown up enough to fight her own battles. I’ll leave,” she turned off towards the door, revealing a shrouded bundle behind her on the table, “Just know that we’ll be waiting for you. The offer still stands; safety, revenge, whatever else you desire along with it. You’re one of us and neither distance nor time can change that fact.”

“_Get. Out,” _the woman pulled her wand out to press forward into the distance between them, the long length shivering with exertion.

She left, a smile on her lips and warmth filling her heart.

"Goodbye Andy, and good luck." 

\---

Two weeks passed before she was willing to open the sackcloth that Hermione had left for her; two long arduous weeks where she had used every last bit of her knowledge and funds to do this _ her _ way, without any influence from those she had left behind. Throughout it all the conversation had remained present in the back of her mind, a mirror showing off faces that she had half forgotten while her heart ached with a foreign sense of loss. 

When she broke (and was there ever a question that she would?) it was deep beneath the silent veil of a full moon; the land surrounding her ethereal and ghostly under the rays of a silver sun. Everything she had kept inside came spilling out towards the surface with the speed and grace of a geyser until all her hatred and rage had boiled over into something like the madness that she knew they shared but were unable to be rid of.

Only one of the texts she’d left behind proved to be of any use to her, within its pages lay the tenets of three spells; a Binding, a Curse, and a Cleansing. If she managed to do this right then she would summon forces long forgotten and hidden by her ancestors, magic lost in the centuries since it had been put to paper. They would spill out across the man her anger targeted in a wave of hatred and retribution until there was nothing, and no one, left to mourn.

The anger (not unusual but so much stronger now that she’d been gifted with this unwanted knowledge, with the truth to her current standing among her lineage) spilled up through the back of her throat in an acidic poison that only urged her onwards through her madness, towards the future where she could have her long sought after revenge. That Bellatrix (and thus by extension Narcissa, and now Hermione) had given her this text while knowing about her target was something of a mystery that she was sure she would one day need to solve, but unless she actually accepted their offer and spoke to them it would remain nigh on impossible.

No matter; she needed her strength for this task, and questions for her sisters could wait.

\---

She needed Cleansing first; the better to accrue the power necessary for her task.

The spell was more of a ritual than not, ancient and more ruinous than what could be described as polite ‘Dark Magic’ in these more enlightened times. Cleansing the soul, purging the mind, expelling each and every foreign influence that hadn’t been with her when she was born.

She would wipe the slate clean and remove any semblance of control along with it.

The lingering Bond she held to a body deep beneath the ground would fade and snap, the protections weaved onto her by a man who had promised to protect her child (not send her off to war to die) would wither and degrade. It all would go, wiped and burned away, leaving her whole and ready for the rest.

\---

Carving runic symbols into her skin was a far harder task than she had initially led herself to believe.

The first time went rather swimmingly, all things considered, but most of that had been due only to needing just thirteen specific symbols to be etched upon her skin. Another boon was that each location was easy to reach (by magic or hand), and when they were done they were done; simple cuts, easily acquired and healed.

After that she had brimmed with more power and energy than she had felt in ages, ready and willing to go after the Binding next.

That particular bit of magic had been harder than the Cleansing, but not so much that she couldn’t accomplish it with a bit of grit and teeth bared in wretched smile. Every last dredge of Family Magic that she had formed with her bond to Ted and the birth of Nymph had been sucked back from wherever it had settled across the world, all wound up in a tight ball of heat that filled her veins and broke apart her thoughts.

Twenty six intricate symbols, three kilos of crushed pyrite, and the blood that had once flowed through all of them.

Arduous, yes.

The worst?

No, not by far.

The particular distinction of _ ‘Worst fucking idea in the history of Andy, Ever,’ _ ended up belonging to the last bit of ritual magic that she planned on using; the Curse. It was as Dark as anything could come, harder than any ritual she had participated in before, and just reading it had voices whispering inside her skull and fingers burning where she had touched the pages.

The fact that she attempted it on the full moon managed to help with grounding her to others _ like _ her, all women the world over seeking help and affirmation, revenge and cold-blooded satisfaction, anyone seeking boon and bounty amid the unspoken horrors of the night. Seventy-eight specific runes needed to be carved into her skin, all no less than three centimeters deep and large enough to read from a good distance away. 

She pulled her flesh away with a sanctified knife forged from Goblin Silver, each mark filled up with the ashes of a dead man related to her target. When she was just barely over halfway through her task she nearly ended up giving in to the pain and horror of what she was doing, nearly succumbed to the madness and the terror that swirled around her mind.

Her breath had come to her in fits and starts while the knife remained wavering in her grip, one hand on her thigh to rub ashes into the wounds as her eyes darted off towards her wand, forbidden thoughts of healing tugging against her willpower. 

_ ‘I have to,’ _ she turned away from what could be her salvation, _ ‘For Nymph, for Ted, for-’ _

She cut herself again, unwilling and unable to think on the loss of her only remaining family.

Though…

That wasn’t quite right, wasn’t it?

If what Hermione had said was true then she still had two sisters, and another one now as well. Maybe her words had been true, maybe they were all lies, but she had come much too far to give up on the cusp of success. All the skeletons and demons of her past were on her heels, waiting for her to fail and fall, an outcome she couldn’t abide.

She was a Black; no matter how long removed.

And Black’s did not fail.

\---

Rodolphus was content. 

And if he was not content, then at least he was happy.

And if he was not happy, then he didn’t care, because he would be dead.

Not that he had any plans on dying anytime soon; no, that would come about in a century or two when he was old and doddering. Right this moment, this here and now, was a time for pleasure.

Their Lord had seen fit to grant his requests once all the bodies had been strung up; a divorce and lenience from all the madness, from all the fighting and the terror. Gods knew he needed it; taking down that pink haired bitch of an Auror had nearly pulled him limb from limb with the ferociousness that she had fought. No matter though, she was dead, he was not, and his cock was currently plugging up the throat of some wasted Muggle whore he’d taken back with him from an _ ‘excursion’. _

Midway through his minutes long process he pulled the hair of the woman between his legs, body warming and heating as he came closer and closer to completion, approaching the apex as his limbs filled with fire, his chest filled with warmth, his… his…

The woman managed to pull herself out of his grasp fast enough that the purple flames Rodolphus burst into were unable to burn her, her body scooting backwards towards the wall as he wailed and screamed unnaturally, his whole body slowly succumbing to the flames that rippled and expanded as though viewed through a shifting kaleidoscope of terror. There was no sound, no expanding area of heat or distress, only wide eyes and aching fear as his body disintegrated into ashes before her very eyes, a pale flash of light being the last glimpse she had of the burning man before he was replaced by a pile of crackling embers and ash.

Here one moment, burning the next, gone to nothing after that.

She fled the room with feet nowhere near fast enough to send her away from that horrifying sight.

\---

Andromeda watched with a pair of ethereal eyes as Rodolphus Lestrange died of Soulfire; a horridly gruesome death that purged the Soul through Flesh, an end that she wouldn’t have believed actually possible if she hadn’t seen the results herself. Happiness, or at least something kin to it, blossomed beneath her chest for the first time in years as his final screams gave way to crackling embers. A yawning chasm beneath her breast opened up to fill in with a cackling voice that twisted her own tone with that of the _ Other, _ the twinned soul that she had feared was real ever since her Grandfather had sat her down at the tender age of _ ‘Too fucking young to deal with this.’ _

That conversation had been half of the reason for her self-imposed exile, the other half being the imminent threat of death after disownment handed down by her Aunt and Uncle. That her sisters would pepper her with anger and hatred had been an afterthought, unpleasant but necessary all the same.

But now, as the drifting remnants of Rodlophus’s soul flashed away into wherever they passed, she could _ feel _ whatever was inside of those specific rituals dredging up her own dreaded Family Magic. She might have created her own magics by bonding with Ted, by giving birth to Nymphadora, but beneath it all still lay the shifting and cloying remnants of her ancestors; Black as her ash covered soul.

The book hadn’t lied (and certainly she had known _ exactly _ which library it had come from), but in her anger and her hate she had assumed all the words were threats more than truths, that Hermione might have driven herself off the edge but wasn’t down far enough to doom her. No; in the end the youngest Black hadn’t tricked her at all (merely torn out some pages, removed some warning labels,) and it was her own damned fault that she had awoken something flaring and fighting her for control.

_ ‘I think,’ _ she mused to herself as she brushed off ash and admired the now healed scars emblazoned on her skin, _ ‘I think it’s time to go home.’ _

The emotion of her decision rung out across time and space to connect her with the Others, linking them and their souls until she could only laugh at her misfortune and misguided efforts at revenge.

The Others, full and happy and _ complete _ for the first time in years, all laughed along with her.

**Author's Note:**

> Like Bellamione? https://discord.gg/pcfMU4F come on in and join the server!


End file.
